The invention relates to a shelf-stable, bake-stable, smooth-textured cheese product, other bakeable savory spread and filler compositions and to processes for preparing them. The savory, especially cheese, products provide a number of product variations and combinations.
Cheese is a favorite that extends across generations and cultures. In America and Europe, in particular, people enjoy cheese at any meal and at many times in between. One very desirable combination with cheese is to serve it with some form of baked goods. Bread and crackers are popular choices and there are, in fact, cheese-flavored breads and crackers available on the market. Other combinations of this type employ a shelf-stable cheese filler in combination with pretzels, crackers, puffed snacks and the like. Products of these types are satisfactory to some extent, but the cheese filler lacks a desired creaminess and smooth melt that would be desired. Also, the crackers must be baked first and then filled. There is no known technology to add a cheese filler to an unbaked dough and achieve a baked product having suitable texture, flavor and shelf-stability.
In U.S. Pat. No. 3,741,774, Burkwall, used the term “shelf-stability” in his context, to define a single property, i e., microbiological stability. Burkwall provided a simulated cheese product containing 5 to 35% of sugar or sugar equivalents to lower the osmotic pressure of the cheese to “render it substantially free from bacteriological problems”. The high water content (20-40% by weight) of Burkwall's product requires the presence of a high sugar content in order to achieve microbiological stability. However, the provision of large amounts of sugars (13 parts sucrose versus 5 parts cheese in the Example) is largely incompatible with savory flavors such as cheese. The high percentage of protein binding agents (10% to 50% by weight) and starch (5% to 30% by weight) are also incompatible with the provision of a smooth and creamy texture necessary for a good cheese filler.
As a practical matter, the property of “shelf stability” requires more than microbiological stability. Indeed, there are a number of organoleptic and rheological criteria that must be met before a product can be considered “shelf stable”. There is a technical challenge in modifying a savory food such as cheese such that it becomes shelf stable and stable to baking, i.e., bakeable, without sacrificing its flavor or creamy texture.
To be fully shelf stable, a product must maintain its texture. The savory food must also retain its flavor, and it must not adversely affect that of a copackaged baked dough such as is found in pretzels, crackers or puffed snacks, such as cheese-filled puffed snacks, e.g., cheese balls, in terms of taste, texture or color. This means that the baked dough portion of the composite product must maintain a crisp texture. It must not become soggy due either to the migration of moisture from the cheese or oil-soaked due to the release of oil, i.e., so-called “oil out” from the cheese.
The problem of oil release from the cheese is a particular problem. Oil release affects the texture of baked dough as well as its flavor and color. Moreover, when oil is released from the cheese, the flavor and texture of the cheese are also altered. In U.S. Pat. No. 5,935,634, Gamay, et al., describe a low-water activity cheese product containing 40 to 70% cheese and utilizing 1 to 10% lactose and 2 to 15% of a humectant to provide shelf stability. The examples reporting satisfactory results and utilizing the claimed amounts of cheese also included over 5% of sugars and alkali metal lactates. It would be desirable to achieve shelf stability without utilizing either sugars or lactates. And, it would be desirable to achieve this in a product that was stable to the heat of baking and showed minimal if any oil release initially and over time.
In the case of cheese products, it is important to provide significant quantities of cheese. In U.S. Pat. No. 4,752,494, for example, Tang, et al., describe a “thermostable cream” containing any one of a variety of flavors, including savory flavors, in a formulation designed to achieve their objectives. Essential to meet their objectives is the presence of Ca++ ions, caseinate ions and corn syrup. While they refer to their product as savory, the sole example on cheese-flavored fillers employs about 10% cheese (in the form of cheese powder) and more than 50% corn syrup. The product is said to withstand baking and be shelf stable, but the presence of the binder and the large amounts of sugars in the corn syrup will seriously detract from a desirable cheese flavor and texture.
In U.S. Pat. No. 5,529,801, Morano points out that products of the type produced by Tang, et al., suffer from a common problem in the art when dealing with water-soluble gelling agents, whether protein or carbohydrate based. Typically, these products require significant water contents to hydrate the gelling agent. Morano would like to provide an essentially water free product and proposes the use of an ultra high surface area cellulose which is able to hydrate in a hydrophilic liquid phase comprised of an edible polyol humectant. Thus, this composition requires the presence of a particular form of cellulose to avoid the need for water, and fats are preferably avoided because the product is desired to be fat free. It would be desirable, however, to meet the challenge of providing a bakeable cheese filler without resorting to adding cellulose or decreasing fat.
There is a need for a process that would enable modifying a normally unstable, savory food such as cheese to render it stable to the heat of baking without sacrificing its flavor or creamy texture. As used herein, the terms “bakeable”, “bake-stable” and “stable to baking” are used interchangeably and refer to a minimal heat stability of a cheese filling within a composite baked dough and savory filling product, such as a filled pretzel, cracker or puffed snack, to maintain suitable homogeneity and rheology and to remain acceptable as a filling without significantly degrading the baked dough. Among the puffed snack products are starch-based snack products, possibly extruded, such as cheese balls and the like. Products such as cheese-filled cheese balls can be coextruded as an enrobed “rope” of the savory filling within a “rope” of dough that is fully cooked, e.g., baked, during forming by extrusion or thereafter. Products of this type can be made by a number of techniques, such as, for example, as described in U.S. Pat. No. 6,210,723. For example, , a cheese filler is extruded within a casing which consists of an unbaked dough which typically would comprise a corn or wheat flour and/or starch. In this context, the terms “bakeable” and “bake stable” refer to rheological and homogeneity stability at savory filler composition temperatures in the range of 115° C.±5%. Such temperatures would be encountered for example, in a filled extruded product, such as a cheese filled puffed snack, prepared using an extrusion process wherein the temperature of the extruder at the tip of the extruder die would reach 155° C.-160° C. Such temperatures are sufficient to cook the unbaked dough surrounding the cheese filler. That is, their temperatures are sufficient to gelatinize the corn or wheat starch which typically would be in the casing surrounding the cheese filler, and such temperatures would ensure that raw flavor notes in the starch would be eliminated or minimized.
In the case of filled cheese and cracker-type products it would also be desirable for the cheese balls or crackers to maintain their crisp textures—not becoming soggy due either to the migration of moisture from the cheese or oil-soaked and off-flavored due to the release of oil, i.e., so-called “oil out” from the cheese.